Fear not @Fortuleo! It seems like the majority have positive things to say about this song. This production is awful, but it can't keep a good song down. Nice catch on the "Misfits" similarities. Now I know why I was thinking this sounded like a song from the Misfits era. This was on the Come Dancing compilation. I have always liked it, and think it's a beautiful melody and vocal by Ray. I'm not sure if it's fair to blame the 80s. There are plenty of songs with an 80s sound that are totally tubular. This song does not fall into that category. Many of the 60s artists didn't know how to adapt and are usually the ones that are very guilty of a bad 80s sound. There are 80s synth pop tunes that hold up and are embellished by their 80s production style. I would have loved to hear this song if The Kinks recorded it in the early 70s. This production almost falls into the so bad, it's good category. My favorite song is still coming up, but this is right behind it. A lovely tune.
... to a sad and lonely heart In this lovely moment, from sad to heart is a fourth dropping down to a seventh (which kind of begs for a resolution to the tonic), distinctive and beautifully sung by Ray. This has been driving me crazy but I finally figured it out, it's the same interval he sings in a similar way in Working Man's Cafe during the chorus: Don't you know [he was a working man]. This has been haunting me for days so I had to share, lol. Now I could be off base but it seems to me that for the first time on a Kinks album I'm hearing quite a few songs that remind me quite a bit of latter Kinks and Ray's solo work. Property has that vibe, and Heart of Gold is a another example, its jangly alt-country sound would fit right in on Americana (think A Place In Your Heart). Definite Maybe, which many have already remarked is like a prequel to No One Listen, also reminds me a bit of Yours Truly, Confused (and both are highl suggestive of How Are You, which is referenced once again in Americana's The Deal). Perhaps this is due to Dave's reduced involvement around this time (I believe I've read that at this time he was living elsewhere would only fly in to lay down the guitar parts after most the tracks were mostly finished). It's as if Ray is starting to mature into its final, Dave-free form. Which is great for people like me who love Ray's solo albums, but probably not good news for folks like @The late man .
I've only listen to those a couple of times so far, but it was the first thing that came to mind on my revisit here
“Don’t Forget to Dance” – I like the lyrics a lot, other than a little problem with the last verse that implies others need to find you attractive for you to feel good about yourself, but I appreciate what he was going for. The chorus is OK, but the verse seems like “Misfits Redux,” as others have mentioned. I’m getting a little more tolerant of the (admittedly appropriate) 80s slow dance ambiance in this one, and I can appreciate the feeling of it, the vocals, and the “sea of sighs” that @All Down The Line mentioned, but this won’t make my playlist. 3/5 I’m starting to wonder if it may not be just the production style of mid-80s synth-pop that turns me off, but also that it may have too much association with a happy time in my life that was about to be turned upside down by unexpected curveballs, with the residual sad/painful feeling that goes along with it. I do know I need to be more open-minded about styles I resist. I get frustrated with my cousin, with whom I’ve shared decades of music talk, who when I try to get him to listen to certain Kinks songs, will dismiss them with “it's OK, but it's not as good as ‘You Really Got Me.’” So 30 years of songs are rejected because they don’t live up to a (to his mind) career peak in the mid-60s! We’ve had the same discussion about Wild Honey vs. Brian Wilson’s earlier full productions. There’s so much good music that can be missed by constantly comparing it and judging it for what it isn’t. So I want to work harder not to fall into that trap. I guess this is a good album for my practice.
Great comments so far, as always. A couple of quick points...I like the way the line "You do the things you do the best" is sung over what has previously been an instrumental hook. A nice touch and delivery. In 'X-Ray', there's a description of a more mature lady as being "what RD would have called 'a nice bit of old'"; I always thought this was quite an amusing and playful term, hopefully not offensive to anyone. It wasn't until I listened to this album after reading the book (I'm yet again going back, only this time to the mid-'90s...) that I noticed the phrase in 'DFTD'.
Well, both Bowie and the Kinks were 1970s label mates at RCA and that both Bowie and Ray had a theatical flair that suited them well in the MTV era. However, Bowie briefly became a superstar w/"Let's Dance" while the Kinks had a lower commercial peak.
6. Don’t Forget To Dance (Alternate Mix) – Bonus track released on the 1999 Velvel CD reissue of State Of Confusion and the later 2004 CD/SACD hybrid. Same full length edit as the UK 12”, but a different mix from the 12“. It’s closer to the 7” singles but different still. 12 bar intro. Drums are dry plus different instrument placements and relative volumes. Missing some synths and the “No, No, No. Don’t Forget To Dance” refrain vocals at the end. Slight fade. Could be an early mix prior to overdubs, or a remix specifically for the 1999 release. The CD liner notes don’t clarify one way or the other. ____________________________________________________________________________ Don't Forget To Dance Great discussion from everyone again and I too expected more negative comments, so nice to see the positivity. Always liked this song and the sentiment even when I was younger and the 80s production doesn't bother me too much, though I prefer the drier versions without the extra sheen. That said, I think it will be quite some time before I listen to this song again .
Wow, this US mix is so much better than the album version. I still don't like the song but this is much less painful to my ears.
Don't Forget To Dance A nice companion piece to "Come Dancing". I remember when I first heard the album I thought "Don't Forget To Dance" would make a nice 2nd single from the album. And it actually was! It got some decent airplay. Ray seemed to have at least one good slower ballad type song every album around this time and this was the one for this album!
There is a Kinks Story Doco video where Ray seems to reference that the record company considered having a big pop hit would be counter to their image/album credibilty or sonething along those lines.
Maybe neither act where comfortable with how far they had to go to achieve their 1983 success? For one i think Bowie said he didn't want to be Phil Collins!
That's how I first heard it (and learned to dance) and it was years before I heard any other version or Michael Street-mix!
No as since i had been given this US 7" i had no reason whatsoever to obtain an Oz copy that i assumed to be identical. N.b. Now if it was a Stones 7" i would buy a 30th copy of the same title even for the different label or font!
Don’t Forget to Dance Never knew of this song or heard this song until a couple weeks ago. I immediately thought of it as a Misfits re-write, and not just the beginning. Also the verses, and particularly the last verse I think included the bass part of Misfits just plopped right here in this song. All that said, it’s still a good song because I loved Misfits! “You look out of your window Into the night Could be rain, could be snow But it can't feel as cold as you're feeling inside” Here we have one of the Ray Daviest Ray Davies lyrics that’s ever been Ray Daviesed. It’s the looking out the window, combined with that marriage of weather and mental state/personal emotion. Look a little on the sunny side. Rainy day in June. End of the season. Stormy sky (apologies to those who wish to remove that song from their memory. It’s great!). There’s a change in the weather. Along with nostalgia and friends, I think we have seen (and discussed!) that weather is like the third corner of the triangle that is Ray Davies. There can’t be a fourth corner because we know he’s not a square. “A nice bit of old” - I read this not as her being the nice bit of old, but rather this being more like… it’s not often that the young punks whistle at her anymore, so when they do, it brings to mind little memories of her past, when that sorta thing happened more often. Just “a nice bit of” that “old” feeling. A nice ballad for sure, but I wouldn’t put this in my top 50 Kinks Kuts. I will say though that I am really enjoying this album a lot.
Well I presume the expression "A nice bit of old" is very English and your angle is a twist that would never have occurred to me.
Here is an update from my UK Record Collector Kinks Singles article. Now i might be getting ahead of myself with the mention of some B sides but I think I will avoid disgrace from our headmaster as I have never played truant from his thread! N.b. 2 shots to follow.
Young Conservatives. stereo mix, recorded Feb-Mar 1983 at Konk Studios, Hornsey, London Have you heard the word? The revolution's over. Now the anger's disappeared And the rebels are much older. And the schools and universities Are turning out a brand new breed of young conservatives. Get yourself a brand new scene, Keep your collars white and clean, It's time to come and join the young conservatives. Revolution used to be cool, But now it's out of fashion. Politeness is the rule, And not an angry young man's passion. And they've used up all the alternatives, And they're rushing down the street to join the young conservatives. Conservatives. Ban the bomb, oh how contemporary, In your parents' car. Another chip off the block, is that all that you are? Look at all the young conservatives Hanging out in the bars. It's got to stop before it goes to fa-fa-fa-fa-far. Get yourself some new attire, Set your sights a little higher, You're going to join the young conservatives. The establishment is winning, Now the battle's nearly won. The rebels are conforming, See the father, now the sons. All the urgency and energy Have turned into complacency, Now the schools and universities are turning out a brand new breed of young conservatives. Conservatives. Rebel, rebel found a cause, Now it's Hampstead not East End And now he's such a well respected man. The only action that you see Is in the Sunday Times. Content to sit in bed and read between the lines. Rebel, rebel join the young conservatives. Be a devil join the new conservatives. It's a victory for order Now they've beaten everyone. The rebels are too old now, And the young just want to be young. All the urgency and energy Have turned into complacency. Now the schools and universities are turning out a brand new breed of young conservatives. Conservatives. Look at all the young conservatives. Look at all the young conservatives. Written by: Ray Davies Published by: Davray Music Ltd. Hopefully we can get through this one without getting into the tar pit trap of political affiliations..... Interestingly enough, this lyric doesn't sound like it particularly has anything to do with political parties. Aside from the catchphrase of the title, it sounds more like an observation of the yuppie movement of the eighties to me.... having said that though I don't have much knowledge of British politics in the eighties. There was the Iron Lady and the Coal Miners, but that is the extent of my knowledge really.... but the description of the people in the song is young and upwardly mobile white collar workers, and I am not altogether sure one could lump them all in one category. Whenever I have talked to people about this kind of thing, they are rarely what the demographic figures suggest they are. The revolution is over and the schools are now pushing out a new breed.... taught to be good consumers. The new scene of white collar workers was starting to move into computer tech, and everyone wanted to be a white collar worker, who could be, because a lot of them had seen the toll being a blue collar worker can take on a person via their parents. It's odd that the western world with its comfort levels higher than any other single group of people in the history of the world would want revolution anyway. Even the poorest of those in the western world were pretty much rich, when taken on a global scale. So I'm not altogether sure what there was/would be to particularly revolt against. The eighties had the fear of the mushroom cloud constantly pushed down everyone's throat. All the post nuclear holocaust movies, Chernobyl hadn't happened yet, but wasn't far away. The Day After came out in November 1983 .... Three Mile Island had happened 3 or 4 years before... there were "Nuclear is unclear" Bumper Stickers everywhere. What is now apparently the "Peace Sign", had started off as a "No Nukes" logo morphed into an anti war logo, and seemingly is now recognised as the Peace logo. The whole eighties bright colours and light bouncy music was a direct reaction to the world environment of the time. To go with that, a generation or two of parents had been reinforcing to their kids that they needed good jobs so they didn't have to toil in the dirt, and they backed it up with discipline, expected good grades at school, and a lot of kids moved into office and middle management jobs rather than hard labour jobs and such... to the point where skilled tradesmen became a rarity in many instances not long afterwards.... So I'm not convinced the observations that Ray is making here have anything to do with political affiliation. In fact in Australia pretty much everyone I knew thought all politicians were crooked assholes, and that is a healthy way to look at them, and remain friends with people that actually live in the real world with you, instead of arguing about who is less of an *******. Anyway, that's my perspective on the lyrics here. It is a very good observational Ray lyric, but I think he is attributing the changes to the wrong thing. Yuppies and consumers are who he is describing, and that was pretty much everybody in one form or another. ... but I'm sure folks are going to set me straight here lol. because I generally have an odd perspective, or so it seems. This is a pretty straight rocker, and it rocks along nicely. The verse and chorus have a nice bit of "ba. ba. ba-da" to them, and the bridge works really well. We get a nod to David Watts (It's got to stop before it goes to fa-fa-fa-fa-far.)and Well Respected Man (And now he's such a well respected man.) also, bringing that conceptual continuity back to the fore, a little more subtly than Destroyer. I don't really agree with Ray's interpretation of what was happening, but I like the song. That's all I'm willing to say about this one, and I hope it isn't enough to get it deleted.
This reminds me of Where Are They Now from Preservation Act 1, but this time he's referring to old revolutionaries/protesters (maybe the original punk rockers as well?) being too old, and the next generation not being interested. Peter Garrett of Midnight Oil made a similar remark a year or so ago bemoaning the lack of politics and protest in modern music. Anyway, I like this!
My brain might have blocked my memory of this song. As we were going through this album and I was thinking that the standard of songwriting was so high (regardless of whether or not the matching music was to my taste) and then side two, track two - in my view - we hit a real klunker. Politics aside, this is just not a song or performance that I particularly enjoy. As a general analysis of the era in which the Kinks were a band, the late 1960s and early 1970s were generally seen as a time when young people were examining the status quo and rebelling against it. By the 1980s, I think it would be fair to say that the generation that had rebelled (in the U.S. against the Vietnam War) had started to rejoin the Establishment. In England, Thatcher rose; in the U.S., Reagan (my American cousin - a few years older than me - once told me she voted for Reagan twice). "Young Conservatives", I think, is commenting on that phenomena - how rebellion morphs into acceptance. But I really don't like the song especially its attitude towards its subject. The only thing I like about the song is its self-referential aspects like using the term "well respected man" and how the "Fa fa fa fa fa" part recalls "David Watts". I also do not like the way Ray sings this song (I guess it is part of whole tone thing that I don't like).
Oct 1963 - Nov 1966 - Kinks get a haircut Apr 1967 - Feb 1970 1965 Never Say Yes 1965 Who'll Be The Next In Line tv 1966 Trouble In Madrid Lincoln County promo video Nov 1970 - Jun 1976 Lola, Percy and the Apeman.... 1974 Ray interview Ray Interview with Studs Terkel 1969 The Kinks Move To Arista Records Feb 1977 Sleepwalker Life On The Road - OGWT 77 - ITV 78 Mr Big Man Sleepwalker - Mike Douglas - OGWT - Supersonic - SNL - Outtake Brother Juke Box Music - single - OGWT Sleepless Night Stormy Sky - OGWT 77 Full Moon - live 77 - Ray live Life Goes On - OGWT 77 Artificial Light Prince Of The Punks The Poseur On The Outside - remix Elevator Man Kinks Live Feb 1977 Ray acoustic Apr 77 Kinks Old Grey Whistle Test show 77 Kinks Live Dec 1977 Christmas Concert 1977 The Pressures Of The Road Nov 1977 Father Christmas - video - live 1977 - tv promo - Dave live May 1978 Misfits Misfits - tv 1978 Hay Fever - live? Black Messiah Rock And Roll Fantasy- the hotel room - live Paris 1978 In A Foreign Land Permanent Waves Live Life - US version - UK tv Out Of The Wardrobe Trust Your Heart - live 1979 Get Up 1978 The Misfit Record EP Lola live in the hotel room UK tv 1978 The Misfits Tour Live in Paris 1978 Sept. 1978 20 Golden Greats Jul 1979 Low Budget Attitude Catch Me Now I'm Falling - remix - alt mix - The Late Man, Sea Cows In Love Mix Pressure - live 1983 National Health Superman (ext. mix) - single/album mix - ext fan mix - video - straight mix 12" Low Budget - Extended mix - Live 89 - Ray Live In A Space A Little Bit Of Emotion A Gallon Of Gas - Live in 1982 - Full US single version - Alt mix Misery Moving Pictures studio outtakes Hidden Quality Duke Nuclear Love Maybe I Love You Stolen Away Your Heart Mike Konopka Restores the Kinks for the Velvel Reissues The Low Budget interview Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Aug 1974 Live At Cobo Hall Ray On Wonderworld The Kunks Ray on the Stones Compilations part 1 The Kinks (France 78) Dave Davies - AFL1-3603 Where Do You Come From Doing The Best For You Visionary Dreamer Nothing More To Lose The World Is Changing Hands Move Over See The Beast Imaginations Real - Dave live In You I Believe Run Wild Man June 1980 One For The Road - The Concert Video - The 1979 Setlists - Cover analysis - album review Opening/Hardway - Hardway video Catch Me Now I'm Falling - video Where Have All the Good Times Gone - video Lola - video Pressure - video All Day And All Of The Night - video 20th Century Man Misfits Prince Of The Punks Stop Your Sobbing Low Budget - video Attitude - video Superman - video National Health Till The End Of The Day Celluloid Heroes - video You Really Got Me - video Victoria - video David Watts Slum Kids 79 live July 1980 The Live EP - Promo EP 1980 Waterloo Sunset EP Live at the Palladium 1980 1981 The Kinks - What's It All About? Jul 1981 Dave Davies Glamour Is This The Only Way? Glamour Reveal Yourself World Of Our Own Body Too Serious Telepathy 7th Channel Eastern Eyes 1981 Chorus Girls Aug 1981 Give The People What They Want Around The Dial - live 1982 - extended intro Give The People What They Want - video - extra verse Killer's Eyes - live 1982 Predictable - video Add It Up - live 1982 Destroyer - tv show - YRGM/Destroyer Don Lane Show -ext mix? - vimeo Yo-Yo - live 1982 - Tokyo 1982 Back To Front - live 1982 Art Lover - live 1982 - alt version - SNL 1981 A Little Bit Of Abuse Better Things - Kast-Off Kinks, with Ray - single - live - TOTP 94 b-side Massive Reductions Ray Interview Compilations part 2 1981/82 1981/82 Tour Ray And Chrissie Postcard From London Rockpalast concert 1982 US Festival Ray On Wonderworld 1983 Dave Davies - Chosen People Tapas Charity Mean Disposition - video Love Gets You - video - live Danger Zone True Story Take One More Chance Freedom Lies Matter Of Decision Is It Any Wonder Fire Burning Chosen People Cold Winter One Night With You b-side - live Dave Interview June 1983 State Of Confusion State Of Confusion - live - video Definite Maybe Labour Of Love Come Dancing - TOTP - Stuttgart - ext - demo - Ray live - Frankfurt - US mix Property - live Don't Forget To Dance - video - live - video - ext - US mix - Aus mix - Alt Young Conservatives State Of Confusion tour You Really Got Me reissue State Of Confusion EP Compilations part 3 1983 - +1 Spotty Grotty Anna mono Live In Frankfurt in 1984 Kinks live TOTP 1994 Dave Creeping Jean live 2004 2005 Thanksgiving Day Ray live on Conan Obrien Oct 2018 Dave Davies - Decade - interview If You Are Leaving (71) Cradle To The Grace (73) Midnight Sun (73) Mystic Woman (73) The Journey (73) Shadows (73) Web Of Time (75) Mr Moon (75) - Why Islands (78) Give You All My Love (78) Within Each Day (78) Same Old Blues (78) This Precious Time (78) Rob Kopp has made his 1999 Kinks discography 'Down All The days Till 1992' US Chart Stats The Music Industry Machine Mick Avory Pete Quaife - interview - Kast Off Kinks - I Could See It In Your Eyes - Dead End Street Rasa Didzpetris Davies John Dalton John Gosling Jim Rodford Ian Gibbons Andy Pyle Gordon Edwards Clive Davis
Musically? The last beat has my vote. It’s to the point and ends what’s otherwise an undistinguished track. I don't think "conservative" is necessarily about a political party, it's a state of mind, it could be named "young conformists". I do agree with the lyrics, though, even more so now that the French school system’s evolved in the same direction, after almost forty years of resistance. I agree with them, yet I find them more uneven than usual. Some good lines ("the young just want to be young", "content to sit in bed / and read between the lines"), but some others are too obvious, not too well crafted and for some reason the “ee” rhymes don’t sound too good to my french ears (“complacency”, I really don't like how Ray phrases that). I too would say the best lyrics here are the well-respected “fa-fa-fa-fa fa fa(r)”’s, a brilliant throwback to a much subtler dialectic tall tale of conformism. I find it more eloquent and to the point than the rest of the song, it comes across loud and clear. We know exactly what you mean, Ray.
